The accountability principles can promote sustainability if they are applied correctly. However, who is ‘policing’ how the standard is being applied.
• For all intents and purposes a person could with no prior experience set themselves up as an assessor and audit against AA1000AS.
• AA1000AS will be interpreted and applied differently and with varying degrees of rigour unless there is some kind of panel providing a standardising effect
In most other fields where standards are applied there is an overarching authority which has control over how the standard is applied. My particular experience is in the pharmaceutical industry and in the UK each manufacturing site has to have a Manufacturing Licence – in effect it’s Licence to Operate. The site earns its licence by meeting the standards expected by the regulatory agency – tested by inspection every 2yrs or so. If in the inspectors view the standards are not being met the site can be summarily closed.
With CSR, companies can choose their favourite assessor, who they pay to provide a service. The assessors though are not accountable to anybody.
Can Accountability take action if you see your std being miss-applied?
The number of sustainability assessors is likely to proliferate should Acountability lobby for a national body to prevent rogue assessors being set up and for proper professional standards to be maintained.
The concept of ‘current good practice’ is well established in the pharmaceutical industry. This is the evolution of a practice resulting in higher standards being applied commensurate with good science and good sense. Perhaps Sustainability needs something like this to be established through a national/international accepted body. Would sectoral guidelines for the assessors be a good idea?
Don’t get me wrong here I am not in anyway putting down what Accountability have achieved to date, I think what they are doing in this area is hugely valuable. I just think there is a potential for the value to be diluted by poor practice unless the practice is better regulated.
Going back the AA1000AS it stands on the inclusivity principle which I like. Identifying and involving the right stakeholders I believe is key to sustainability. One of those key stakeholders I believe has to be ‘future generations’. This is a voiceless group so should this group get an automatic right of representation or a ‘voice’? Perhaps this could be achieved via the std requiring that this stakeholder be addressed rather than leaving it open to identification and prioritization
best regards
StewyM
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